They don’t seem to mention how it was detected in space in the first place.
Is there planetary nebulae in our solar system and it was detected with a spacecraft? If so where did it come from if it came from a dying star?
Is there planetary nebulae in our solar system and it was detected with a spacecraft? If so where did it come from if it came from a dying star?
Fullerenes are by far the largest molecules positively identified in space. Due to the high symmetry of the molecules, they have a very specific and quite simple vibrational fingerprint.
https://www.nature.com/articles/369296a0 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_interstellar_and_circu...
Indeed, this is how the presence of C60+ in the interstellar medium was absolutely confirmed (and was the first assignment of such a near-IR to UV absorption line from the interstellar medium).[0]
The problem with the Ehrenfreud paper is that the spectrum was recorded in frozen neon and the interaction between the analyte (C60+) and its matrix (frozen neon) is strong enough such that the perturbation is larger than the certainty of the positions of the spectral lines. Definitive laboratory assignments therefore require studying the molecules under (as close to) identical conditions as the interstellar environment, including high vacuum and low temperature.
The detection of neutral C60 was, as you say, performed using infrared (vibrational) spectroscopy.[1]